My Albums of the Decade (part two)

Earlier this week I tackled five of my ten favorite albums from the past ten years. Now, on this chilly Christmas Eve, it's time to complete the task. Once again, this list makes no attempt to be objective or all-encompassing, nor is it in any particular order. To recap, here are the first five picks.

1. Interpol- Turn On The Bright Lights
2. The Arcade Fire- Neon Bible
3. The National- Boxer
4. Rufus Wainwright- Want
5. Explosions in the Sky- All of a Sudden I Miss Everyone

And now on to the final five.

6. Ben Folds- Songs For Silverman

While The Ben Folds Five was kind of a mixed bag, I think they just came around in the wrong decade. The 1990's were dominated by alternative rock, the mainstream acceptance of hip hop and the sudden, shocking upswing of electronic music. The Five had more in common with 70's standards like Chicago than they did with their contemporaries. It wasn't until Ben Folds decided to go solo around 2000 that the cultural climate seemed fertile for his brand of piano-driven melodies. Personally, I think Folds missed the mark with his solo debut Rockin' The Suburbs, relying a bit too much on guitars and production tricks that seemed a bit too shiny. His follow-up LP Songs For Silverman is the real sweet spot. Every song on the album is fantastic, so much so that I struggle to pick a favorite.

7. M83- Saturdays = Youth

M83 went through a pretty significant transformation in second half of the 00's. With a major personnel change, the group abandoned much of the atmospheric, low-energy music that first put them on the map and then began exploring some sounds that were practically the opposite of their early work. 2005's Before the Dawn Heals Us is awesome in its own way and is one of the more intelligent hard-rock albums of its time. But 2008's Saturdays = Youth is one of the most remarkable, inexplicable pop records I've ever heard. It mixes evolutions of 80's New Wave like "Kim and Jessie" with unbelievably exciting rock tracks like "Graveyard Girl" without abandoning longer, more ambient-sounding bookends.

8. Bat For Lashes- Two Suns

Natasha Khan's beautiful, bizarre outfit Bat For Lashes almost never hit our collective cultural radar. After her education under the likes of minimalist composer Steve Reich, her debut album Fur and Gold barely made a splash at all. To this day it's only sold around 60,000 copies, which isn't bad for a true indie record but certainly doesn't stand up to the big names on the charts. Khan's sophomore effort did in a few months what Fur and Gold did in a few years. Two Suns is widely regarded as one of the top albums of 2009 and it even produced a Top 40 hit in "Daniel". I love this album for its uniqueness. It's surreal, heartbreaking and ever so pretty.

9. Goldfrapp- Supernature

A prime example of why pop isn't necessarily less artistic than avant garde, Goldfrapp's 2005 album Supernature escapes the two corners into which the group's first two albums trapped them. Whereas Felt Mountain is low-key and hard to follow like any proper art-pop record and Black Cherry rode the last waves of the electronic music craze, Supernature is a lively grab-bag of styles that stand so well on their own that they largely avoid being pigeonholed into one pop wave or another. I especially enjoy "Satin Chic", a full-on glam rock track that sounds like a 21st century cabaret.

10. Wilco- Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Really, Wilco didn't need to make Yankee Hotel Foxtrot like they did. They could have coasted on their rootsy country rock for another couple years. After all, it was in fashion for some reason in the middle of the decade. Instead, they decided to do something ambitious in 2002, making an album that was both emotionally genuine and full of little electronic quirks. It would end up being one of the last great things done by Jay Bennet, who died earlier this year. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is a fine example of a band doing something new instead of leaning on old successes.